On the Wings of the Breeze
by CSIBuckeye
Summary: Late entry for the Elemental Ficathon at Geekfiction. How his friends try to help Grissom cope after Sara leaves.


The humid breeze hit him squarely in the face as he burst through the door, and like a jab from a worthy opponent, he never sa

Title: On the Wings of the Breeze

Author: CSIBuckeye

Rating: T

Pairing: GSR plus the team

Spoilers: Through Grissom's Divine Comedy

Disclaimer: No infringement intended, no money made

A/N: Ridiculously late entry for the Elemental Ficathon Challenge at Geekfiction. Prompt: Breeze

Many thanks to d.dangerlove for using her precious free minutes to beta this!

The humid breeze hit him squarely in the face as he burst through the door, and like a jab from a worthy opponent, he never saw it coming. His chest heaved as he scanned the parking lot, partially from the short jog down the hallway, but mostly from the knowledge that the wind blew into his face. Gone. She was gone. And with her went everything; his equilibrium, his future, the very beat of his heart.

He glanced down at her letter still clutched tightly in his hand and fought back the sob that threatened to escape into the night. It was goodbye. Once he could have imagined it, hell he'd even half expected it. But not now. Not now. Even after what they'd been through, he hadn't seen it coming, or maybe he just hadn't wanted to see.

Folding up the piece of paper, he placed it in his pocket before turning and trudging back to his office, each heavy step taking him farther away from the man she'd helped him become. And by the time he found his way to his chair, he was well on the way to resurrecting all the walls he'd had in place before he'd let himself love her. She had been his light and without her he could feel the darkness already beginning to creep steadily closer.

It began immediately, the doubles and triples, anything to stay out of the house. It was just too full of Sara and it hurt too damned much to be there. He was so close to everything that was hers but to be unable to hear her laugh, see her smile, feel her body against his, it was just too much. Her presence at home was so powerful, so thick, that he found it difficult to breathe there. It was so much easier to just lose himself in the work, in the comfort of the familiar. So he did. Working until he could barely stand, let alone feel. Stumbling home every few days so bone weary he couldn't remember how he'd gotten there. Waking up to shower, change and head back to work, unwilling to examine the evidence of his own withdrawal.

But just because Grissom didn't want to see, didn't mean the rest of the world refused to. Brass made his way through the hall towards his friend's office. He had broached the subject about a week after Sara left, both of them as uncomfortable as hookers at church, and he'd let Grissom off the hook at first. They were guys after all and notoriously bad at all that touchy feely crap. But when Grissom had been pointedly evasive during this last case, Brass had decided he'd had just about enough. So it was that he found himself standing in the night supervisor's doorway. "Come on."

Glancing up briefly from his desk Grissom said, "I can't," as he returned his gaze to the file in front of him.

"It's not a request," Brass said as he walked in, picking up Grissom's jacket and tossing it on the desk. He turned and walked back out the door, not hesitating for an instant.

Grissom sighed as he pushed his chair back from the desk and grabbed his jacket as he walked out. Catching up to Brass at the exit he said, "Jim, I really can't."

Brass just continued to his car, catching a glimpse of Grissom in the reflection of the windshields they passed by along the way, grinning to himself as he shook his head from side to side. It was actually reassuring in the fucked up world that Brass inhabited that some things were completely and utterly predictable. Order out of chaos Brass thought as Grissom slid into the passenger seat and buckled his seatbelt.

"Are you at least going to tell me where we're going?"

"Your place," Brass answered.

"I'm not that lonely," Grissom said.

"Good to know," Brass said with a chuckle.

"If we're going to my place at least let me get my car first."

"No. I'll pick you up tomorrow and bring you back to work at your scheduled time and not a minute sooner." He leveled Grissom with his best intimidating cop glare, sunglasses and all, surprised to find that it worked equally well on criminals and geeks alike.

Comfortable silence filled the car for several minutes before Grissom looked back at his friend. "Did Sara leave my handling instructions with you then?"

Brass felt the smile spread over his face. He knew Grissom and Sara had been in contact and if Grissom was joking about it, then maybe that meant she would be home soon. "Eh, we all know how to handle you. It's just that Sara's been doing such a good job for so long, the rest of us have gotten a little rusty."

And so it went that at least once a week Brass would show up in the office doorway extending a lifeline. Grissom even took him up on it every few times, not because he really wanted the company but to refuse would surely just result in more interference and because he knew it was what Sara would have wanted.

But after the third month without her had come and gone, he began to refuse Jim more and more. He could feel his life closing in on him and in a strange way he actually found comfort in it. The smaller his little corner of the universe, the less he had to venture out, the more in control he felt. Pulling away from his team meant shielding himself from the pitying glances they cast his way when they thought he wasn't looking. He was hurting, his life was in turmoil and he had no desire to share that with anyone except the one person with the power to right it all simply by walking through the door.

Just that thought was enough to make him glance up at the doorway for the millionth time, but in doing so he caught a glimpse of Nick lurking just outside. Shit, he thought as he averted his eyes. Don't come in. Don't come in.

Nick stood quietly in the hallway, unsure of what he was going to say, but knowing he needed to say something. He couldn't ignore things any longer. "Hey boss," he said as he entered the inner sanctum of Grissom's office. "Got a minute?"

"One," Grissom said without looking up. He should have been expecting him. Nick managed to make some variety of uncomfortable offer every few weeks or so. But short of being overtly rude, Grissom just wasn't sure how to deflect the younger CSI's attempts to draw him out.

He could feel Nick's concern in the sigh that slipped from him. He knew Nick was just worried, knew how much he cared about people, especially those he considered his friends and family. It was part of what had made Nick and Sara so close he supposed, their capacity for love and forgiveness and it made Grissom feel more than a little guilty. "I'm sorry, what did you need?" he closed the folder on his desk, giving the other man his full attention.

Nick knew surprise had to be written all over his face. "I…uh, I was just…just checking on you," he finally managed, cringing at his own awkwardness.

"I'm fine," Grissom said.

"Look, I know I'm not you, but if the woman I loved was suddenly gone, even temporarily, I would not be fine." He swallowed, unable to believe he'd just said that out loud.

Grissom sighed, unsure how to make Nick understand. But after a moment, he locked his eyes with Nick's. "When I read a new journal article I get a little flutter of excitement just thinking about sharing it with Sara. When I get stuck on a crossword puzzle I get frustrated that she isn't there reading over my shoulder." He looked down at his hands clasped together on his calendar. "When I have a case that bothers me, I get mad because she isn't waiting for me at home, listening as I ramble on. A thousand times a day I want to see her or talk to her or hold her, and the fact that I can't makes me ache in a way I never knew I could."

Nick shifted uncomfortably, totally taken aback by the words that seemed to stream from his boss's mouth. He had never heard anything so amazingly wonderful and sad all at the same time and he wondered if he would ever feel that way about someone.

"But that pain, in each of those moments, that belongs to me alone and I want it for myself." Looking up once more he said, "Because as much as it hurts, it lets me know I'm still alive and I still feel. Can you understand that?"

Nodding his head slowly Nick simply said, "Yeah. Yeah I can," as he turned away, hoping the other man hadn't seen the moisture gathering in his eyes. And for the first time he saw Grissom as not his boss or a father figure but as just a guy, doing his best to get through the worst thing life had ever dealt him. And he knew without a doubt that if anyone could find a way to get through it, Grissom would.

By the end of the fifth month, the pain seemed to have taken up permanent residence inside his skull and his world had diminished to the sound of the blood rushing in his ears and the feel of his heart pounding against his ribs. He had pushed himself right into pneumonia, somehow unable to take a break for that even when he'd tried to. So he sat at his desk, tissue in hand and tried to concentrate on the never ending paperwork from the case. But even in his weakened state, he heard her coming long before he actually saw her.

People scattered in her wake as Catherine marched through the hallways. She had tried to gently prod him into action, tried to get him to talk to her about things in the round about way that he preferred, but it just hadn't worked. And she had finally had enough. "Go home Grissom," she said as she stormed into his office.

He grunted his response, not even looking up from the file on his desk.

She reached over the organized disarray that covered his work surface and slammed the folder shut. "You're on leave."

He peered up at her from over the tops of his glasses, his eyes burning with the effort it took to focus them. "Unless there's been a shake-up in administration that I don't know about, you don't wield that kind of power.

"No, but the sheriff does," she sighed as she slid a piece of paper onto his desk. "Sign it Gil, or I will go to him."

He stared at it, not registering the specifics, gleaning only that it was an open ended leave of absence form. Glancing back up at Catherine, he noticed the set of her jaw and the narrowed eyes that he was fairly certain said "Don't fuck with me," across the pupils. He arched a brow slowly in response, pulled off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, "Okay."

"We can't watch this anymore," she said, continuing to stare at him, but softening her gaze. She was unsure if she should be relieved or concerned that the expected fight hadn't ensued, hoping that maybe he'd just realized how much he needed the break. But part of her was terrified that he simply lacked the strength to care enough to argue. She walked around behind his desk and swiveled his chair around to face her as she knelt next to him and covered his hand with hers, "Fix this."

The breath that escaped him took almost every last ounce of energy with it and his shoulders sagged in defeat, "I don't know if I can."

"Go see Sara," Catherine said.

"It's not that easy. This isn't about me."

Her eyebrows shot up in disbelief, "Can you really be this dense?" But at the blank look on his face, she had her answer. "Of course you can."

He narrowed his eyes at her, "Is this supposed to be making me feel better?"

"No, this is supposed to be a kick in your ass." She pulled him onto his feet and led him towards the door. "Don't you get it? If it's about Sara, then it's about you too. You ensured that the moment you actually let yourself love her."

He stopped, seemingly frozen to the floor as her words echoed in his mind.

"You have to right yourself. What would Sara say if she saw you like this?"

He smiled just the tiniest bit at the thought. "She'd tell me I look like hell," he said running his hand over the unkempt beard he sported.

"And she'd be right," she said with a laugh. "I never realized how good Sara looked on you until…now."

"You mean until she was gone," he said as he turned and bent over the desk, signing the leave form and shoving it in her direction. He knew he should feel bad about the look that fell over Catherine's face because she was right of course. But like everything anymore he couldn't quite bring himself to care. He was vaguely aware that she was calling his name as he walked out into the early morning, but he never looked back.

Stepping through his doorway, he didn't notice that there were no lights left on, or that there was no dog standing there begging for his morning walk. He didn't even miss the smell of coffee brewing or the sound of the bedroom shower running. He didn't notice them because they weren't there. Those things were the pieces of a life that didn't exist at the moment, a time he longed for with every fiber of his being and yet couldn't bear to let himself think about.

He tossed his keys on the coffee table and walked to the bank of living room windows, unlatching one and pushing it open wide. The breeze that drifted in caught him by surprise. It was crisp and cool and he breathed it deeply into his lungs, relishing the unfamiliar cold burn in his chest. He stood there eyes closed, drinking in long gulps of air as he mulled over Catherine's words.

He and Sara were intertwined, she was right, but she had no idea the extent of it. From the moment he had seen her, with wide eyes and a messy ponytail at the Forensics Academy conference, he had felt this unexpected need to rescue her. But Sara had never really been a damsel in distress; he couldn't save her because she'd never needed him to. She'd certainly saved him though, a thousand times in as many different ways.

And as he glanced around the room that had once been so full of life, he realized exactly what he'd been doing. He was waiting for her to come home, to save him once again. He had put life on hold as he passed the days waiting for her to return, so she could fix him. But Catherine's words rang true; he needed to right things on his own this time.

The soft knock at the door roused him from his thoughts and he flipped on the lights as he walked across the room. Mrs. Delmonico, the dog sitter, stood outside the door with Hank sitting obediently at her side. And as the door swung open the dog walked in and gave a big sniff before trotting over and jumping onto the couch, plopping down with a heavy thud. Apparently he wasn't the only one waiting, Grissom thought as he smiled crookedly.

"Same time tomorrow, Dr Grissom?"

"Actually no, Hank and I are on vacation," he said.

"I see," the middle aged Italian woman eyed him and nodded her head. "You need it."

"Yes, I know," Grissom said, actually laughing at her appraisal. She had been Sara's neighbor in the apartment complex and her forthrightness was matched only by the depth of her affection for Sara. He was certain that she held him personally responsible for Sara leaving and that she only continued to watch Hank because he belonged to Sara too.

"Staying home then?"

"Actually I was thinking of a road trip," he said.

"San Francisco is lovely this time of year," she said as she turned and walked away.

"So I hear," he said with a smile as he closed the door.

And as they cruised along the highway with the windows down, he couldn't help but wonder how Sara would feel when he showed up. Would she see this as his attempt to ride in on a white horse or would she be able to see the enormous dragon that he'd slain to reach her? All these months he'd thought that running after her was about some idiotic need to save her, when all along, the only person who had ever needed rescuing was him.

The door to the bungalow was open and as soon as Grissom put the car in park, Hank bounded out the window and up onto the porch with a resounding, "Woof."

The creak of the screen door was as slow as her movements, and she couldn't quite decide if the two of them were real or simply the end result of so many wishes cast into the wind. But when she felt the dog nose her hand and then lick her palm in a slobbery greeting, her eyes shot to Grissom's and she took the steps two at a time to get to him.

He pulled her into his arms, burying his head in her neck and breathing her in, refilling his soul. "Sara."

The feel of his arms around her was the sweetest combination of relief and joy. As much as she knew he was her home, she hadn't quite managed to convince herself that she would find her way back. But as she squeezed him even tighter, she knew in both of their hearts they'd never truly been apart. She felt a tremble run through him and thankfulness welled up inside her as she turned her head to gently kiss his bearded cheek.

He felt the wetness on his cheek as she kissed him, not sure if it had come from him or her, not that it mattered. Nothing else mattered except that Sara was in his arms and he knew that never again would he let her go without a fight. He pulled back slightly, making that silent promise to her before he kissed her.

"What took you so long?" She sighed as she took in both the fatigue etched on his face and the rejuvenation behind his eyes.

He smiled at her, "Big dragon."

She nodded as if that made all the sense in the world. And in the grand scheme of their relationship, perhaps it did.

The End


End file.
